Relationship between cervical diffusion tensor imaging and somatosensory evoked potential in patients with cervical intraspinal tumors / 中华神经医学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To explore the correlation between cervical diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and median nerve short latency somatosensory evoked potential (MN-SLSEP) parameters in patients with cervical intraspinal tumors.Methods Twenty-two patients suffering from cervical intraspinal tumors treated with surgical resection were enrolled into study group from February 2015 to May 2016;meanwhile,22 age-matched volunteers were selected as control group.Cervical DTI and MN-SLSEP detection were performed 3 d before operation and one month after operation,respectively.The whole cervical spinal cord was divided into 3 areas,the tumor head area,the tumor area,and the tumor tail area;and the fractional anisotropy (FA) values of the 3 areas were calculated.The white matter fiber bundle was reconstructed by diffusion tensor tracking (DTT) to observe its integrity.Study group was further divided into delayed latency group (lat+ group) and normal latency group (lat group)according to the delayed latency of N9-N20 interpeak levels,and the FA values of the 3 groups at different areas were compared.Results Total removal of the tumors was achieved in 19 patients (86.4％) and subtotal in 3 patients (13.6％,two with nerve fibrolipomas and one with intramedullary neurilemmomas) of the study group.One month after the operation,the spinal function was improved in 17 patients (77.3％),and not improved in 5 patients (22.7％).The preoperative N9-N20 interpeak latency in the study group was significantly longer than that in the control group (P＜0.05).In term of preoperative fiber tract morphology of study group,the proportion of delayed N9-N20 interpeak latency in patients with interrupt type (75％) was significantly longer than that in the patients with intact type (21.4 ％,P＜0.05).FA values oflat+ and lat group in the tumor head area,tumor area,and tumor tail area were significantly lower than those in the control group (P＜0.05);and FA values of lat+ group in these three regions were significantly lower than lat group (P＜0.05).Conclusions DTI metrics correlate with MN-SLSEP measures.Through variations of quantitative parameter values and fiber tract morphology,cervical DTI can sensitively and intuitively reflect the electrophysiological changes,which could be served as a important diagnostic tool for cervical intraspinal tumors.